Documenting the live music performance is tough. That’s why there are so few really good concert films.
What makes the live music experience so unique – the pounding sound system, the unified sense of oneness that emanates from the screeching crowd, the eye contact with your real-life guitar hero - is immediately voided by the detached experience the medium of film provides. What needs to be captured is the drama in creating the performance, so that the performance itself takes on an element of engagement that would not have been apparent to the live audience.
Martin Scorsese’s The Last Waltz and his Rolling Stones documentary Shine A Light achieved that; Michael Apted’s Bring On The Night, in which he documents Sting’s 'Dream Of The Blue Turtle’ solo tour, gets it right; Jonathon Demme’s collaboration with Talking Heads, Stop Making Sense, and the Led Zeppelin concert/concept film The Song Remains The Same, co-directed by Peter Clifton and Joe Massot, are as good as it gets. Even the Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana film is a pretty good example of how involving the concert format can be (watching my 8 year old daughter groove to it indicates that it captures the backstage/onstage vibe pretty well...).
With one classic live recording already to their name ('Live After Death’, recorded over 4 nights in March 1984) and a global fanbase that has kept their legend alive for 37 years, heavy metal anti-gods Iron Maiden finally provide their devoted followers with a live concert document that rivals the very best – Flight 666. But it is not specifically the concert footage (extraordinary, especially projected in crisp, stunning digital) or the choice of songs (a greatest hits package) that makes it so compelling, although all those elements are catered for very satisfactorily. What makes this film utterly absorbing are the logistics of the tour itself – as the poster states, '50,000 miles, 5 continents; 23 concerts in 45 days".
The band members themselves prove to be invaluable as filmed subjects – from the alpha-male force-of-nature lead singer Bruce Dickinson to the classic heavy-metal drummer Nicko McBrain (best name in rock music ever!), Iron Maiden are an aged band of supreme music professionals who understand the impact their music has on fans in territories like Costa Rica, India, Argentina – countries, all chronicled in the film (along with Australia, Japan, Canada and the U.S.) that have never seen a full-blooded metal session like that which Maiden unleashes and who are captured in all their ravenous zeal in this film.
Directors Scott McFadyen and Sam Dunn (Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey) have created a marvellously entertaining film. If you are not a metal fan, you will still be enthralled by the scale of the event that is an Iron Maiden concert. Flight 666 (named after the specially-outfitted jumbo-jet 'Ed Force One’ that Dickinson pilots to each destination) is an exhilarating film experience – ambitious, insightful; a testament to a group of (old) men who do what they do for the outlet it provides their talent and the joy it provides their fans.
Share
